Abyssal Awakening

’Switch!’ Alyss shouted in mind as the two of them swapped places once more.

Clenching her teeth, Alyss tried to manoeuvre out of the way using fancy footwork, but Allura was faster.

With a grin that made her look like a demon, she slammed her foot down.

*BANG!!!

The ground shattered beneath Alyss as she lost her balance. Allura’s hand was inches away from grabbing her face when Alice took over.

Swinging herself by using Allura’s arm as a bar, Alice spun into a handstand and tried to kick Allura in the face.

"Soft like cotton." Allura let out an evil chuckle, grabbing Alice’s foot and throwing her overhead.

Flying through the air, the force made it hard for Alice to correct herself with just her base strength.

Following closely behind, however, was a series of heavy stomps like a behemoth. An unstoppable berserker who was ready to rock her sh*t.

Quickly swapping over, Alyss twisted her body and planted herself against the ground.

*BANG!!!

Parrying Allura’s punch, she diverted most of the strength back towards the ground. Or at least that should’ve been what would’ve happened.

Instead, the impact sent her recoiling back as Allura leaned over her, using her height advantage to overpower Alyss’s technique.

Unable to stand on her feet, Alyss crashed across the ground and flipped herself upright.

Yet all she saw was a fist rushing towards her face.

"!!!"

Out of panic, energy shot through her body in an instant as Alyss tried to go for a parry.

"Tsk tsk, I thought we said using base strength only? We’re cheating now, are we?" Allura caught Alyss’s counter with ease as flames erupted from Allura’s hands.

Nightmare energy flowed outwards as it replaced the use of her normal energy.

As long as she carefully controlled her output, she could still fight!

"Ah sh*t..." Alyss mumbled, realising her mistake.

She had just opened the dam for Allura to use energy against them.

’What have you done!!!’ Alice widened her eyes.

’I’m sorry! I panicked!’

’You’ve doomed us!!!’

’AHHH!!!’

*BOOM!!!

Flames violently erupted from both Allura’s arms as she detonated an orb right by Alyss’s stomach.

The explosion sent the girl flying up as Alice took over, creating a blood platform behind her to stabilize herself.

"Mom’s a bit rusty, so make sure you don’t go above 3 Sigils, okay? Any higher and I can’t play with you." Allura appeared behind Alice with a toothy grin.

Slamming her punch into Alice’s barrier, the two of them crashed towards the ground like a meteor and slammed into a river.

Immediately, a burst of flames evaporated the water around them as Allura slammed her palm upwards, causing Alice’s head to whip back.

Disorientated, she was unable to put up a guard in time, with Allura detonating tiny orbs of fire behind her elbow to increase her punching speed!

A rapid release of punches, jabs, and palm strikes struck against Alice’s body, with Alyss quickly taking over.

Yet Allura prevented her from doing anything.

Twisting her body, flames converged into her heel as she sunk it deep into Alyss’s stomach!

"!!!"

*BANG!!!

Digging out a trench in the land, Alyss had to quickly pull herself free.

The momentum of the battle was heavily in Allura’s favour. Unless she could do something about it, this fight was as good as gone!

Shadows twitched around her as limbs burst out, creating a field that should slow her down.

She doubted she could hold the woman back, but every second felt like a miracle!

But Allura had other plans.

She wouldn’t give Alyss even a second to rest!

Flames crackled behind her body as she held her breath.

Before sound could even catch up, Allura had detonated the sparks behind her and appeared in front of Alyss.

The fire around her body burned away the shadows before they even had a chance to try and grab her.

"!!!"

Widening her eyes, Alyss found herself frozen and unable to move.

Physical Resonance!

Alice took over, transforming her body to blood at the last possible second.

*BANG!!!

Allura’s hand phased through Alice’s body as she raised her eyebrow.

"What happened to Mom asking you not to go past 3 Sigils?" she chuckled.

"It’s just Resonance, still within Three Sigils, right?" Alice forced a smile as she slammed her palms down.

Blood spears shot forward as she took aim with her finger.

Seeing this, Allura simply brushed her hair back and pulled out a cigarette.

Snapping her fingers, a tiny flame flicked onto her fingertip and lit up the cigarette while she twisted her body at the last moment to dodge the attacks.

*BANG!!!

Firing a basic Void Flux using just her standard control, Alice watched as Allura grinned as she jabbed her fist forward.

Detonating her flames at the point of impact, the Void Flux was scattered apart as she exhaled a puff of smoke.

"It’s my ability in the first place. You think I wouldn’t know its weakness? The Void Flux, or rather, the Nova Core, is weakest when it’s just been fired. The ’shell’ can be disturbed and thus negated."

*BANG!!!

Stomping down with her foot, an array of flaming pillars erupted, burning away any blood that was hidden beneath the ground.

Alice’s smile twitched as she tried to trick Allura’s focus using her Void Flux.

Yet she still noticed the trap she was setting.

As expected, fighting someone like Allura with so much experience was going to be difficult.

Flicking her cigarette into the air, Allura crouched down.

Time felt like it slowed down for a moment as she detonated a cluster of orbs behind her.

Fearing that it would be another sudden jump in speed, Alice quickly created several barriers while also preparing to activate Duality the moment she spotted Allura.

However...

It was a feint! Allura simply grinned as she caught her cigarette.

She wanted Alice to create barriers around herself.

"Say, my dear. How many times has your body been hit by me up to this point?" Allura asked ominously as Alice paled.

She felt a bad feeling surging up from the pit of her stomach.

"Taking inspiration from the stories you told me, I put my own little spin on things. The first strike will detonate once." Allura took another drag of her cigarette.

"But the second? That’ll explode twice. The third, three times. This will continue to increase with each subsequent hit." She chuckled.

By this point, palm prints and fist prints were beginning to glow across Alice’s body.

"Next time, try not to get hit so much."

*BANG!!!

A constant eruption of explosions rang out inside Alice’s barrier.

Since she was afraid of Allura’s charge, she had made sure the barriers were extra sturdy.

But with Allura predicting Alice’s panic, she had now transformed that barrier into a prison where the power of each explosion would be reflected back onto Alice instead of being wasted outwards!

Watching the fireworks go off inside the barrier, Allura walked over to the chair and sat down.

She knew this wasn’t enough to knock out Alice. Far from it.

But the explosions would occupy her long enough that she wouldn’t be able to do anything else for the time being.

Letting out a soft exhale, Allura glanced down at her own hand.

Seeing a slight tremble, a bitter smile appeared on her face.

Just this much and she was already starting to approach her limit. Nightmare energy could only do so much for her unless she progressed further. However, without knowing exactly what she was dealing with, Allura was apprehensive about advancing with this new energy.

Especially when Nyer was the one who was controlling it.

Either way, it was good enough to serve as training for now.

However, anything more than this and Allura wouldn’t be able to keep up. She had already developed a new method to best conserve her energy, but she was still tired out after just some light sparring.

Seconds turned to minutes. And soon, the explosions finally ended as the barriers had long been dismissed in order to reduce the power of the explosions.

Her outfit was a mess and so was her hair. With her face covered with dust and dirt, Alice pouted and sat next to Allura without saying anything.

Letting out a slight chuckle, Allura patted Alice’s head.

"Hmph!" Alice puffed up her cheek as Allura gave it a gentle poke.

"You could’ve just said it was over. Why did it have to keep exploding for so long?" Alice grumbled.

"If I don’t do that, how else would you learn? You struggled to take the initiative back and kept taking blow after blow. What if the opponent had a weird ability where, after taking ten hits, you lost a limb?"

Pausing for a moment, Alice recalled the sight of Rine losing the use of her legs and slowly nodded her head.

Smiling helplessly, Allura picked up Alice with ease and sat her on her lap.

"Come now, stop pouting. Sparring is over for today. I’ll think about what to work on and we can change the training a little tomorrow. For now, let’s just enjoy ourselves and relax for a bit, okay?" Allura comforted as Alice nodded her head.

With Allura next to her again, Alice wanted to be spoiled since she had been stressed for so long.

Alice didn’t know what happened after, but she must’ve fallen asleep as she woke up on Allura’s back.

She was carrying Alice back to their room.

Alice hesitated for a moment before asking the question on her mind.

"Mom... Do you think I can live up to all the expectations placed on me? I’ve inherited so much but... I don’t know if I can do it." Alice tightened her fingers.

"Of course. But I don’t expect you to. People place unrealistic expectations on each other all the time. When the time comes, I just want you to ask yourself one question. Did I do my best? Can I be proud of it?

"If you can answer those with a yes, I think you’ve done enough." Allura replied as Alice dwelled on those words.

When she reached the end...

Could she say yes to those questions?